RESUMO
The American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine (originally chartered as the Academy of Hospice Physicians in 1988) is an organization of physicians devoted to advancing hospice and palliative medicine in the United States. The academy's mission is "physicians dedicated to promoting quality hospice care for the terminally ill through medical education, research, and training." The academy obtained specialty recognition from the AMA in 1996 and became the first physicians' group to publish its position on physician-assisted suicide in 1991 and again in 1997.
Assuntos
Cuidados Paliativos na Terminalidade da Vida/história , Sociedades Médicas/história , Previsões , História do Século XX , Cuidados Paliativos na Terminalidade da Vida/organização & administração , Humanos , Objetivos Organizacionais , Sociedades Médicas/organização & administração , Estados UnidosRESUMO
A patient with acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) was admitted to a hospital with cough and fever and after 29 days was transferred to a hospice. He was eventually shown to have active pulmonary tuberculosis. This diagnosis was obscured clinically by simultaneous infection with Pneumocystis carinii and Mycobacterium avium complex (MAC). Laboratory recognition of Mycobacterium tuberculosis was delayed because of overgrowth of cultures by MAC but was later established using DNA probe techniques. Thirty (19 percent) of 158 health care workers who had been exposed to this patient had conversion of their tuberculin skin tests. Diagnostic difficulties and nosocomial transmission of tuberculosis may occur when patients with AIDS have mixed mycobacterial infections.
Assuntos
Síndrome da Imunodeficiência Adquirida/complicações , Pessoal de Saúde , Doenças Profissionais , Tuberculose Pulmonar/transmissão , Humanos , Doenças Profissionais/diagnóstico , Teste Tuberculínico , Tuberculose Pulmonar/complicações , Tuberculose Pulmonar/diagnósticoRESUMO
A required 16 hour hospice clinical rotation was developed as part of a medical student family practice clerkship. The effect of the hospice rotation on student beliefs and attitudes towards the care of dying patients was measured by pre- and post-test questionnaires using a Likert scale. Sixty-five completed pre- and post-tests were analyzed using a paired t-test. It was determined that there were statistically significant changes in responses to 15 of 23 items. The rotation positively affected student attitudes about hospice care, student attitudes about a hospice rotation, and beliefs concerning palliative care. The authors believe that qualified hospice programs can, and should, serve an active role in teaching medical students about the physical and psychosocial aspects of caring for the dying.
